Local support for Athletes’ actions
The Progressive Starkville Network, a group with nearly 500 local members, stands in support of the members of SHS’s girls’ volleyball team who recently chose to peacefully advocate for racial justice and equality by kneeling for the National Anthem during their game against New Hope.
PSN affirms the perspective of the National Association of Secondary School Principals, which states, “students must first know that school is a safe place where they can learn to amplify their voices courageously and constructively. They need to be empowered to have those conversations now so those skills are well practiced when they participate in a democracy and ultimately lead their future…. None of this happens when schools teach a ritual compliance, even when prompted by a wellmeaning respect. Compliance, after all, is a skill in little demand for 21st-century success.”
We are dismayed with some local responses to these girls’ actions online and in social media. We are disheartened that angry and hateful comments have been thrown at these local high school students. The anger and hatred this simple action
On the spending and borrowing side, the housing bubble of the 2000s fostered some bad habits. As real estate values rose, people started seeing
their home as the pot of gold funding their retirement. They figured they didn’t need other savings.
Many also started treating their homes like piggy banks. As home prices rose, they refinanced their mortgages, borrowing
more so they could take cash out for whatever. Home equity loans were another means of doing that. Mine came with a checkbook, meaning I could pay the electric bill by reducing my home equity (the part of the house
that I, not the bank, owned).
Toward the end of last decade, the bubble popped, and for many, the magic money vanished.
Savvy Americans with high net worth seem quite able to guarantee clear sailing in retirement.
Others who don’t plan, can’t plan or are in too desperate straits to put anything aside may end up working for the rest of their lives. That presupposes they can work. What if they can’t?
Follow Froma Harrop on Twitter @FromaHarrop. She can be reached at fharrop@gmail.com. To find out more about Froma Harrop and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators webpage at www.creators.com.